So it looks like Adele is on track to smash the current world record for fastest selling album worldwide, currently held by a Japanese artist Hikara Utada who sold a shade over 3 million copies (in just Japan) first week.

US sales are at 1.9m with 4 days left, and UK sales are probably in the region of 400k - 500k~ right now.

I'll reproduce my post from the 25 album thread here as it's relevant


PS It's my understanding that the 1.9m figure for the US is just for the first 2 days so there are 5 days sales still to come!

Adele (along with 1D, Ed Sheeran etc.) have helped re-established Britain as world leaders in popular music again. We need a few more like her I guess and maybe some new radio and tv programming that recognises this?

Even though she's huge in the UK, is it fair to say it's on another level in the US? That's so weird for a UK artist.

It's a weird one because based on population she's probably about as popular here as in the US. But based on the size of the actual music market in both countries then yes she's probably bigger in the US.

http://www.musicbusinessworldwide.co...25-is-on-fire/

As for 25’s UK sales, MBW revealed yesterday that it had shifted more than 300,000 in its opening 24 hours.

Although we don’t yet have confirmation of what happened on Saturday (November 21), the senior-level music biz execs we’ve spoken to are telling us that a 700k+ UK week one is on the cards.

I thought the record for first week sales globally was Backstreet Boys 'Black & Blue' 5 million first week?

I loved her first two albums (preferred 19), but I was nervous for her new one and fully ready for it not to live up to the hype. However, I absolutely love it. I prefer it to 21 definitely. She fully deserves all praise and attention.

Three days sales in the UK for 25 are 537,000

According to Rolling Stone that is the record

Debuted with a million less than N*Sync

It's widely known they have the biggest debut in the US and Utada holds the overall worldwide record.

'Black & Blue' sold 1.6 in the US first week but the album as a whole internationally sold 5 million copies in that first week.

For US alone it's NSYNC 2.4 mill for 'No Strings Attached' first week but international first week sales am pretty sure it's BSB 'Black & Blue' at 5 million. Did Utada sell 2 million outside Japan/Asia that first week to push her to 5 million?

I'm just saying what Rolling Stone printed which is that Black and Blue sold 5 million copies globally in its first week.

How tragic

At least half of which will probably be found in charity shop bargain bins within a years time......

I just had a scoot around the interwebs and wow, it did - I don't know why that isn't fêted more often rather than N*Stink and Utada.

You leave my NSync alone lol. To be honest, I don't think either of the records get mentioned all that much because they are records that looked likely wouldn't be beaten.

Sorry hehe

After a bit more checking, it seems that Black and Blue figure is for shipments, not sales. It sold 2.4M first week. That's why N*Sync and Utada (US and WW) were the current record holders. Adele has broken N*Sync's record in just three days and is set to beat Utada, too.

http://www.billboard.com/articles/co...gle-week-nsync

Adele will sell 5m+ WW anyway.

750k UK, 3m+ US, #1 in over 108 other countries will easily rack up another 1.5m~

http://i.imgur.com/5QIGBaU.jpg

This has the top ten fastest selling albums in one week, WW.^

She's already #1 in 3 days. Slaying.